


Cassandra

by e_p_hart



Series: Stuff Of Legends [1]
Category: Greek and Roman Mythology
Genre: Poetry, Trojan War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-18
Updated: 2014-10-18
Packaged: 2018-02-21 14:24:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2471426
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/e_p_hart/pseuds/e_p_hart
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You are bowed but not broken, daughter with the wild eyes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cassandra

The winners write the histories,  
you know,  
but you have your small comfort,  
for _you fortold this first_.  
Exactly as Phoebus Apollo said,  
hissed into your ear as you cowed before his rage,  
‘I give you wisdom, little priestess,  
but no one will listen. Remember,  
for I listened to you this night;  
the last mercy you’ll receive.’  
Foolish child, monstrous in your own power,  
given wonders by this cuckhold god;  
you bowed before his might then, and  
you bend under the weight of his gift,  
you bend and you almost break--  
almost.  
  
‘The girl with wild eyes,’ they called you in Troy,  
the princess priestess laid low for her pride,  
and they grew complacent in their refusal to listen.  
Hair tangled, eyes bright, sweating under the chariot sun,  
voice cracking and hands outstretched in supplication--  
you tried to save them, you tried to warn them,  
playing your role even though  
even though you already know what will happen anyway.  
(Your visions are always truth, down to the core, and the  
accompanying bitterness is always this: _they do not heed_.)  
  
Was it a self-fulfilling prophesy?  
Would they have listened if you had played your role:  
docile, quiet, sorrowful, broken and beaten maiden,  
upright and calm in the face of all the horrors, all the terror  
and death  
and suffering  
and stupid, _stupid waste_?  
 **Would they have listened to you then?**  
  
But your gifts do not account for ‘what-ifs.’  
You only danced on the end of the lifeline  
that fell into your hands, knowing, dreadfully,  
all the while, the viper that waited on the other end.  
  
But now this is something different.  
This truth still hurts, but there is a cold comfort,  
that whatever happens here, in this foreseen city  
too far from the ocean that you love:  
 _you saw it first._  
They can’t take that power away from you,  
the only power you have left, in this distant city,  
bound in chains for your pride.  
  
You are bowed but not broken, daughter with the wild eyes,  
no mere man can break you, not Apollo and not Ajax and not Agamemnon--  
you look upon your death and call her mistress. 


End file.
